If you’re only into the fun, it probably doesn’t bother you a bit. But if you care about the division of labor, you probably think it’s unfair that you have to contribute more while others who bring less can enjoy the same outcome as you. This can easily ruin the fun you originally hope for.

I have been to potlucks where people dice up a pickle cucumber, put it in a bowl with diluted vinegar, and keep telling others how much they love it.

I have seen people bringing a tiny bowl of scrambled eggs, diced potatoes, or pasta that probably can’t even fill up one person.

I have also seen people bring an elaborate tray of grilled Korean pork ribs that tasted delicious. Some would bring two huge buckets of KFC chicken or 3-5 pizzas.

If you’re frugal and trying to feed your family on a one income, I think it’s totally reasonable to be budget-conscious. But sometimes when I look at the dishes brought to a potluck, I feel a little sad and disappointed.

Sometimes we also host hotpots at our home and invite our good friends. We also remind them not to bring anything since that’s when we just want to get together and thank them for their help.

Recently, I was invited to a potluck. I bought French bread and had some canned tuna in the pantry, so I made an appetizer and brought some pumpkin seeds together with it. You can also get creative with a lot of inexpensive ingredients. You just need to invest some time into the making of the food, and voila!

Tuna bread & tuna wraps

Conclusion

Deciding what to bring to a potluck is sometimes not easy. You want to bring something delicious that a lot of people can enjoy but won’t ruin your monthly food budget. Instead of stressing about it or deciding not to go at all, we can can try to cook a frugal but delicious meal.

Bread and rice together with a side dish can always make a low-cost yet fulfilling meal for everyone. If you don’t feel like cooking, a pie or Rossetti chicken at the grocery store can save you both time and money as it has helped Mr. FAF and me.

And most importantly, don’t forget to enjoy the good company. That’s what get-togethers are for.

26 thoughts on “What To Bring To A Potluck”

My favourite dish to bring is a fruit salad. It’s easy to prepare and everyone needs a serving of fruits in their diet anyway. My favourite fruit salad is made with a watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew.

At other times, when I am not feeling lazy, I will make spring rolls. I also host an annual BBQ at my house where my friends just come and relax. My wife and I do most of the work. We just had the BBQ last weekend. It was a great time to spend with our friends.

When I worked in our CA office, I always brought the salad. It was pretty easy to get a decent mix of greens, veggies, maybe some fruit and cheese all for around $10-15. Plus, it helped to have something semi-healthy with the platters of cookies and heavier snacks 🙂

My favorite thing to bring is a vat of vegetarian fried rice! I make it with egg, but omit meat. I also like to bring cookies if it’s going to be a larger event. I know some people “cheap out” and bring just a bag of chips to an event, but I like to share my cooking with others.

Thanks for sharing. Love the dishes! We really love this sausage and cream cheese dip, it’s basically 2x packages of cream cheese, 1x can of rotel, 1 lb sausage. 2-3x bags of chips. If we’re looking for a low-cost dinner to share, it’s red beans/sausage and rice. If it’s a breakfast potluck, we bring cheese grits (with sausage), and people literally die right there while eating it because it’s so good. These all make a lot of food, but are easy to make and super affordable, like $5-$12 a pop.

We were just talking about this the other day! We host a lot, using potluck style meals. Many people don’t know what does into hosting and end up bringing very small amounts of food, causing us to have to cover the unfilled needs of the meal. My hubs struggles with this because we are frugal. But my natural nature is to feed everyone tons of food (I’m southern, we like to feed people). So we are struggling with the balance between frugal but not being cheap in these situations too.

Those tuna wraps look delicious! I do run into dilemmas like this too. I find Pinterest to by quite helpful. Many times I would choose to bring mix drinks such as sangria rather than food. You can (almost) never go wrong with alcohol.

Gosh – we had a potluck at the last show I did and I’m sure I annoyed everyone by fretting and fussing over what I should bring. Eventually it was agreed that I would bring juice, which worked out pretty well. It’s hard when you’re the only one in the room making a fraction of what everyone else is making – I think in the future I’ll try to bring ‘fun’ food. Or watermelon. Everyone seems to love watermelon, for some reason.

The potluck I went to had about twice as many desserts as real food too! Gonna stay away from bringing the sweets too, next time I get invited to one.

Nice. I haven’t heard the term party chip before. I once did this..and will no more! They tasted like old salty cardboard and when people had a bite, they would either:
a) leave them on their plate and throw them away is discreetly
b) do the thing where you put the napkin up to your mouth and pretend to wipe your mouth…but actually put the food from your mouth in the napkin. Does that have a name?

For a dinner – style potluck I love to make roasted seasonal veggies – potatoes, winter or summer squash, mushrooms, carrots, whatever else is on sale. It’s so easy to just cut everything up, season and drizzle with olive oil and 45 minutes in the oven. Usually goes well with most mains and is vegetarian friendly of course. It also can be served warm or cold for either summer or winter. For a more casual get together it’s hard to go wrong with hummus, crackers, and carrots. The scrambled egg thing really stuck out to me…can’t imagine eating scrambled eggs that someone made an hour later…even simple hard boiled eggs would be better..

Nice post! I feel the same way. I hate to be the person who brings items directly from the store, but sometimes I don’t have the time to prepare food in advance. When I do buy it directly from the store, I try to get a fruit tray or something similar. I leave it in the same container so I’m not hiding the origin. I have known people who will get store bought cookies, put them in a cookie tin container and act like they made them themselves….and not admit it when they get compliments!

Ha! I never have thought about this. I think the biggest thing is prepping in advance. Like Palmetto Millennial said above, sometimes you just don’t have time, but that’s when I end up bring Levain Cookies at $4 a pop (yes, four bucks per cookie). You can easily create a shareable meal that’s delicious for just a few dollars if you plan ahead.

And a single cucumber in vinegar just made me sad. Definitely LOL’d, but pouted simultaneously.

I usually go to brunch potlucks and I always bring grits and collards in a slow cooker. If you have a slow cooker with your dish in it, it will be the hit of the party because everybody else made something that is meant to be warm and gets cold during the party…but not you! Yours stays hot, which makes it taste better. I make the grits with earth balance instead of butter, which makes the whole dish both vegan and gluten free. Vegan and GF people are always happy if there is something not only edible but tasty. Grits are really cheap (get 5 min grits not instant) and collards are 99 cents a bunch. Sautee them with onions and throw hot pepper vinegar on top. It is a tasty dish that takes 15 mins to prepare and costs less than $4 for enough to serve 10 people.